Kodi Community Forum

Been a lurker for a long time and have been awaiting the best solution for a bedroom setup. My main HTPC is a well built desktop and currently my Samsung 7 Slate perfectly streams XBMC wirelessly to my bedroom set but I want to have a dedicated setup.

The Android sticks are far from finished from what I have been reading and the Pi (correct me if I am wrong) is good but can be under powered for higher bitrate 1080p videos. With all attachments and needed gadgets I have priced the Pi at around 80-90 dollars US.

So I have been recently scanning craigslist for old low power laptops to bridge the gap. My most recent find is an HP 2150p which is listed at 100$ but I know I could probably grab for 75$ or lower if I haggle right.

So my question is does anyone know or believe the specs would be capable of streaming a 1.5gb to 4gb average 1080p-720p video and scroll/update fanart in the menu quickly or at the least faster/smoother than a Pi? My assumption is that it should be fine but I was hoping to have a yes or no before purchasing.

Intel Core 2 Duo U7600 1.20GHz ULV
Chipset: Mobile Intel GM965
Graphics: Intel GMA X3100
2GB DDR2 SDRAM
a/b/g (some sites say n but doubt it) and gigabit ethernet

Raspberry Pi can play 1080p MKV's perfectly, ive played up to 16GB files with DTS 5.1 (HDMI) passthrough.
Problem with Pi is that it has trouble with Wifi, if its a wired ethernet connection youll have no issues other than the slightly laggy UI.

I doubt the Core 2 Duo system has enough power to play 1080 high bitrate videos.

Thats the catch I have been looking at. What is the issue with wifi? could this be solved with a bridged router setup using the ethernet cable or is it something inherent in the speed of the wifi? I have a steady connection and can get 2mb down on my tablets in the same room so the connection would be good

Most HD video will hit 10mb/s and a blu ray rips hit atleast 30mb/s

It appears to be an issue with power from what I have gathered on pi forums. The usb adapter drawing too much power to use the wifi. I think I might just try and grab the pi and use a bridged router to do ethernet. I just get the feeling that we will see a revision c come out with a 1ghz proc which will solve the laggy ui issue. Hate wasting money being an early adopter.

Why not a Pivos Xios DS? Hardware decoding up to 1080p afaik, and the company employs a few XBMC devs. You can either run Linux + XBMC on it or Android and XBMC's own Android port. Way more RAM than the Pi as well btw. They go for ~ 120 USD on Amazon, apparently. I suppose other sites selling them have similar prices. You won't find a second hand laptop that does video as well as this tiny thing. It will be worse, it will be noisier, and it will eat more power.

The Intel ULV will do 720p h.264 but only just. I've had one myself and tested h.264 720p more than once. 1080p is not an option. The GPU does not support hardware decoding.

Yeah that's why I haven't considered it. Why spend 120 on something that wont play 1080p video. Was hoping to see a hardware accelerated rock chip mali 400 so all those little android sticks would do the job but dev seems slow.

I think the guys behind that chip that most of those Android sticks use are stringing XBMC devs along when it comes to hardware support. I wouldn't count on it any time soon, the Pivos is a way more interesting option if you're interested in Android.